Hayley Frances
Tues, 1st Oct, 19:00
What if you had the luminous, terrifying, gentle chance to tour -- or build -- a city you long to know?
Tue, 1 Oct 2024 19:00 - 21:00 BST
If you had the chance to visit, or create, the city of your dreams, what might that look like? Writing in a generation afflicted by war, the poet T.S. Eliot famously used the phrase 'Unreal City' as one of the refrains in The Waste Land. In our time of climate crisis and conflict over borders, writers are increasingly drawn to speculative or dystopian 'worldbuilding'. What if you had the luminous, terrifying, gentle chance to tour -- or build -- a city you long to know?
This could be a city close to your ancestors; an imaginary realm; Atlantis, or even the kingdom of heaven! Inspired by brief excerpts from a range of contemporary and ancient writers, ranging from the medieval Pearl poet to Mark Doty and the architect-poet Fawzia Kane, we'll dwell on words and investigate what better dwellings might be possible.
NB Zoom links to the individual workshops will arrive in your inbox 48 hours before each workshop. Please check your junk folder.
Anthony (Vahni) Capildeo FRSL is a Trinidadian Scottish writer of poetry and non-fiction. Currently Professor and Writer in Residence at the University of York, their site-specific word and visual art includes responses to Cornwall’s former capital, Launceston, as the Causley Trust Poet in Residence (2022) and to the Ubatuba granite of the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds (2023), as well as to Scottish, Irish, and Caribbean built and natural environments.
Their numerous books and pamphlets, from No Traveller Returns (Salt, 2003), Person Animal Figure (Landfill, 2005) onwards, are distinguished by deliberate engagement with independent and small presses. Their work has been recognized with the Cholmondeley Award (Society of Authors) and the Forward Poetry Prize for Best Collection. Their publications include Like a Tree, Walking (Carcanet, 2021) (Poetry Book Society Choice), and A Happiness (Intergraphia, 2022). Their interests include silence, translation theory, medieval reworkings, plurilingualism, collaborative work, and traditional masquerade.
Recent commissions include research-based Windrush poems for Poet in the City and for the Royal Society of Literature. Capildeo served as a judge for the Jhalak Prize (2023)
Anthony appeared at VERVE in 2019 as part of our Saturday Headline event alongside Sumita Chakraborty and Sophie Collines. They also workshopped at that year's festival.
We are thrilled that they agreed to be part of this year's zoom workshop series.